Hi there!
I’m new to HomeAssistant and running into following issue:
I have a working installation of OpenHAB 3 on a Raspberry Pi4 (4GB RAM) and use it to control several HomeMatic Devices (thermostats, switches, sensors, rollershutters) in an entire household via Homegear. The homegear installation runs on the same raspberry.
Due to some reasons (peer pressure ) I want to migrate the whole setup to Home Assistant, problably step by step, but the Homematic/homegear integration is the most important, because it has to run properly from the start while being in the heating period in Germany. (yes I know, doing this in summer would be easier…)
So my questions are as far as I can think:
If I install HASS on a spare Raspberry Pi, can I install also homegear (and the USB antenna) on this device, so I don’t have to use two Raspberrys?
If yes, what is the best way to do it?
How can I port the existing device list from the old homegear installation to the new one, so that I don’t have to pair the existing homematic devices (around 20) again? So that HA will find them from the start.
I don’t know, if I write under the right tag, so feel free to correct me or change the position of this topic.
I would appreciate your help and wish a great November Rainy Day.
The easiest way by fsr to do homeassistant is HAOS. Which as the name implied is an entire OS. (controls the box) so I’d homegear is separate software then no. You’d have to use a hypervisor and run haos in its own v and your other stuff I another VM.
So your answer isn’t as straightforward as you assume. First find out HOW to make it work… Determiyshat components are required and work backwards.
You may find your stuff works off a built in integration and you do nothing. Or you may find your stuff needs a third party black box and you wire to it using xyz…
Theres no single answer and that the beauty of HA.
So go research how your stuff would hook to HA and then start to work out the answer…
That said. Haos in it’s current form (nov 2024) will stress a pi3 by itself. So if you’re doing basically anything beyond kicking the tires and basic on/off you’re looking for something In a pi5 or NUC for your base machine.
so I thought I could get an answer by somebody who uses the official homegear/homematic integration yet, because I would assume he or she knows, what homegear is.
As I wrote I use a Pi 4, which should have enough power.
I’m coming at it from your Pi. There are multiple ways to install HA. And people make a lot of assumptions early and dig a hole. So research and listen to what folks who use that system say. And from the HA side I’m telling you if you want to run them BOTH on the same box you need a lot more than one pi4. Probably a NUC running Proxmox would be my bet. But my exact point is you do jot know until you know the SPECIFICS of what’s required.
I moved my install (of HA alone) OFF a pi 4 because it wasn’t beefy enough. Mind you I have a VERY large install. But it should help you understand where I’m coming from
Abandon your assumption about what you think works.
And that’s what I want to know. I know about the multiple ways of installing docker (and homegear). Unfortunately the official documentation about the homematic/homegear integration (Homematic - Home Assistant) doesn’t say anything about the best way to go.
As for I have an extra Pi, I could install both on separate devices. But for homegear being only a small program (emulating a CCU-Bridge), I would like to test the possibility not to need an extra computer with extra Debian and so on.
So I’d like to have an advice about how to install homegear and HA on the same device or an answer if it is possible first of all.
Sorry, I really don’t want to offend you, but you are making also a lot of assumptions.
Ok if it needs it’s own code you won’t fo it inside HAOS. Thi k of haos as an appliance. You don’t modify it you plug into it. (doesn’t sound like thier stuff runs as an ‘addon’ (prepared docker module inside haos). What you pointed at is the integration which translates whatever is running your other system to HA.
So it points at whatever that is.
If you can get that into its own server /port wherever that is looks like you can plug into it. Not knowing what ‘that’ is as long as you can get it into a virtual machine you can runit in Proxmox most likely. But it’s an entire os. Next to HA. Which is another entire OS. On top of Proxmox (see where I’m going)
Option two is a container install inside docker (similar concept different way to containerize) a bit more efficient but admin goes WAY up
Option 3 core on either BYO install or Supervised. (supervised is a trap avoid it if at all possible) most flexible option but you need to bring your Debian Sysadmin A game. (don’t try it if you can’t spell Linux)
Easiest by far sounds to be haos image on Proxmox talking to BYO system image of your other system also running on prox.
And yes still stretching a Pi4. Pi48g is the Minimum I’d do there in fact. Pi 5 preferred but Nuc is still a better cost option…
You could split the workloads to different machines as necessary but that haos core start with at least Pi4 the add what you need for your other workload.
That being said, you could do a so called “supervised” installation, which would allow you to also run the Homegear container on the same machine. These installations are not the easiest setup though, compared to the other variants.
My recommendation would be, to buy a Mini PC and install Proxmox. There you would run HAOS in a VM, and Homegear either within an LXC Container, or also as a dedicated VM. And with Proxmox as the base OS you always have the ability to add other services, VMs etc. in case you want to try out something in your Home Lab.
If you just want wo get started though and have two Pies lying around, keep the Homegear Pi as is, and install HAOS on the other one. With the integration mentioned above you can integrate Homegear. You can still change your setup to a single-device solution later on.
Thank you for your advice! That’s something to work with.
I will avoid a “supervised” installation in first way.
The solution with two VMs seems doable, though need probably more computing power which I don’t have yet.
I’ll start with the two Pies, keeping the running homegear installation, it is probably the most reliable way to try HA while keeping the house warm.
) I want to migrate the whole setup to Home Assistant, problably step by step, but the Homematic/homegear integration is the most important, because it has to run properly from the start while being in the heating period in Germany. (yes I know, doing this in summer would be easier…)